THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER by 'Indisputably, one of the best nature-writers of his generation' (Country Life)
BBC Radio 4 'Book of the Week'
Written in diary format, The Wood is the story of English woodlands as they change with the seasons. Lyrical and informative, steeped in poetry and folklore, The Wood inhabits the mind and touches the soul.
For four years John Lewis-Stempel managed Cockshutt wood, a particular wood - three and half acres of mixed woodland in south west Herefordshire - that stands as exemplar for all the small woods of England. John coppiced the trees and raised cows and pigs who roamed free there. This is the diary of the last year, by which time he had come to know it from the bottom of its beech roots to the tip of its oaks, and to know all the animals that lived there - the fox, the pheasants, the wood mice, the tawny owl - and where the best bluebells grew. For many fauna and flora, woods like Cockshutt are the last refuge. It proves a sanctuary for John too.
To read The Wood is to be amongst its trees as the seasons change, following an easy path until, suddenly the view is broken by a screen of leaves, or your foot catches on a root, or a bird startles overhead. This is a wood you will never want to leave.
- ISBN10 0857524585
- ISBN13 9780857524584
- Publish Date 8 March 2018
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 30 March 2021
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Transworld Publishers Ltd
- Imprint Doubleday
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 304
- Language English